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Image Credit: sketch of White-tailed Jackrabbit in  White-tailed Jackrabbit Lepus townsendii
The White-tailed Jackrabbit has long ears, a long tail and bright
yellow eyes. Its coat is white only during the winter months.
In the summer, this rabbit has a beautiful grey coat, white ears
and a white tail. The tips of its ears are coloured black the
whole year through.
The jackrabbit builds its home in the sagebrush and grasslands
of the south Okanagan. In the summer, shelters are built in spots
near rocks, shrubs or even in old badger holes. When the winter
snow arrives, the jackrabbit digs burrows into the snow drifts.
The White-tailed Jackrabbit is a very secretive creature. It only
goes out of its home at night.
This jackrabbit likes to eat plants like grass, twigs, roots and
especially lettuce from a farmer's garden.
Female jackrabbits have their babies in the early summer. There
are about four babies in each litter. Baby rabbits, called leverets,
are born with lots of hair. They can open their eyes and even
run as soon as they are born. The mother jackrabbit feeds the
leverets milk until they are five or six weeks old. By then the
babies are old enough to eat plants.
The White-tailed Jackrabbits can run very fast. They can also
swim. It is important for jackrabbits to move quickly so that
they do not turn into dinner for a bobcat, eagle or skunk. These
jackrabbits are endangered because their homes have been destroyed
by humans, and cows are eating a lot of their food. The winters
of the Thompson-Okanagan are very cold for the jackrabbits too.
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